[Qwerty]

Well, I'll be sure not to break laws in Arkansas. Sounds like my worst nightmare.

[July 4th]

Yow...it's not just a spider infestation, but a mean and nasty one.

[Consort]

Maybe they came in through a tunnel that the inmates are digging.

[Pro-Bush]

[stlnative]

My recent thread on FR after being bitten by a Brown Recluse Spider - Warning Graphic Photos of just how nasty a BRS bite can get

[AlexW]

A few more notes on Brown Recluse bites....
While I have had many in my houses for 20 years, and know how to spot them, I have not, to my knowledge, been bitten.

50 years ago, these spiders were confined to the southwest US. Now they are much more widespread.
They are as the name says, recluses and you rarely will find them in the open. They will be in boxes, old clothes or gloves. They bite only if you come in hard contact with them.
The bite will start as a blister that after a day, will collapse in the center, looking like a volcano.
Do not delay, see a dermatologist at once. If treated in first few days with masive doses of Cortisone, the bite will heal.

[mhking]

"Hold muh beer 'n watch this!" PING....

If you want on or off this list, please let me know!

[skinkinthegrass]

Is Shrillary back in AR?...with due respect to spiders... :|

[montag813]

Why get rid of the spider? They should encourage their growth in all prisons, to add to the horror of the experience.

[flutters]

This is interesting. I remember hearing on the news that Ohio has had 2 inmate deaths from spider bites and several inmates are sick. I'll see if I can find an article.

[flutters]

Corrections.com

Former Ohio Prison Inmate Dies Of Apparent Infection
WCMH

A man who developed skin lesions in prison has died a month after being released from the Pickaway Correctional Institution.
The death on May 22 of Clarence Melvin Grubb, 41, of Columbus, came three weeks after a drug-resistant staph infection killed another inmate at the prison in Orient.
Family members said Grubb had skin lesions on his back when released from prison. His 14-year-old daughter found him in his bed, struggling to breathe. He was pronounced dead at Grant Medical Center.
An autopsy was planned Friday by the Franklin County coroner.
Another Pickaway inmate, Sean Schwamberger, 19, of Toledo, died April 29 while being treated for an infection which the coroner found was caused by a drug-resistant strain of staph known as MRSA.
Grubb had a fever Wednesday and was vomiting Wednesday night, family members said.
"I think it was because of this infection on his back," the former inmate's wife, Alice Grubb, said Thursday.
Before developing skin lesions in April, she said, her husband was healthy.
Grubb entered the Pickaway Correctional Institution in Orient, 15 miles south of Columbus, on Jan. 10. He had been sentenced to six months in prison for receiving stolen property.
He was released from the prison on April 24 and immediately taken to the Franklin County jail to await trial on pending breaking-and-entering charges and was released on bond on Monday.
While at Pickaway, Grubb received treatment for a skin infection, a condition that developed after he reported being bitten by a spider, according to prison records.
That was the same problem reported by Schwamberger before he collapsed in the prison's recreation yard on April 20 and died nine days later at the Ohio State University Medical Center.

[flutters]

Prison Inspection Reveals Additional Inmates With Lesions
Officials Say Blood Infection Caused Prisoner's Death
UPDATED: 9:33 p.m. EDT May 2, 2003
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The state prison system began checking every inmate and doing a top-to-bottom cleaning of the Pickaway Correctional Institution on Friday after one inmate died of a blood infection and 72 others reported having skin lesions like those of the dead inmate.


Sean Schwamberger, 19, died Tuesday at Ohio State University Medical Center, where he'd been sent April 20 after passing out in the prison exercise yard.

Schwamberger's family has said they were told his infection may have come from a spider bite or something else, but Franklin County Coroner Brad Lewis said Friday that the lesions were the result of a staph infection.
"It's clear that spider bites could not have been causing these cases," Lewis said.
Prison health officials examined each of the prison's more than 2,100 inmates on Friday and found an additional 37 inmates with skin lesions, bringing the total to 72, said Andrea Dean, spokeswoman for the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
One inmate was hospitalized at OSU Medical Center and four others were kept in the prison's medical ward, she said.
Dean said 14 of the 72 infected since March 4 had fresh tattoos.
"Staph infections are not uncommon and the problem is being exacerbated because of homemade tattooing," Dean said.
Lewis said Schwamberger had a tattoo in progress on his right arm, where the staph infection probably entered his body.
He said Schwamberger's infection was very resistant to penicillin. In order to fight its spread, inmates should wash their hands often and avoid contact with others, Lewis said.
Officials on Friday swept for needles, weapons, drugs, tattoo paraphernalia or other items that could have contributed to the spread of the illness at the minimum- and medium-security prison 15 miles south of Columbus prison, Dean said.
Crews also began cleaning linens, mattresses and clothing as well as the buildings themselves, Dean said.
No prison employees have shown signs of sickness, she said.
Prison officials are awaiting lab results taken from inmates to see whether all are suffering from the same illness.
Ohio Department of Health spokesman Jay Carey said it could take about a week to get the results.
Schwamberger visited the infirmary once complaining about the infection, Dean said. The Toledo man was serving an 11-month sentence for check forgery. The term would have been up at the end of September.
The 72 infected inmates, most of whom have recovered, were scattered throughout the prison, Dean said.